If there's an enduring theme in my work, it's probably the effects of class on American life.

...aware, as always, that the truth isn't much of substitute for a good answer.

Which is why we have spouses and children and parents and colleagues and friends, because someone has to know us better than we know ourselves. We need them to tell us. We need them to say, "I know you, Al. You are not the kind of man who.

Have you ever noticed that when people use the expression 'I have to say', what follows usually needn't be said?

HBO is really famous for hiring good people and staying out of their way until they ask for help, or need it. And that reputation is earned.

People who imagine themselves to be self-made seldom enjoy examining the process of manufacture in detail.

Even at its most perceptive, sociology deals in abstractions.